Being a real estate broker, I hardly can let pass without comment an op-ed piece in the Times last week.

It was written by Karl E. Case, one of the two economists behind the S&P Case-Shiller Indices. Although I regularly object to putting any stock in those numbers for residents of Manhattan (because the statistics embrace whole regions and include only single-family homes), I don’t have reason to believe that Case has any particular axe to grind.